Statement on International Day in Support of Victims of Torture on 26 June 2012

June 28, 2012
The Cambodian Human Rights Action Committee

Press Release -- International Day in Support of Victims of Torture

Phnom Penh, June 26, 2012

Seven leading civil society organizations will mark the United Nations International Day in Support of Victims of Torture with an event at the Sunway Hotel on June 26. Rehabilitation is the theme for this year's 26 June campaign.

Organizers have invited three Cambodian torture survivors to share about the lasting after-effects of torture on their lives. The event is being organized by the Cambodian Human Rights Action Committee (CHRAC), Cambodian Defenders Project (CDP), Cambodian Human Rights & Development Association (ADHOC), Transcultural Psychosocial Organization Cambodia (TPO), the Cambodian League for the Promotion and Defense of Human Rights (LICADHO), United Kingdom-based REDRESS, and Hong Kong-based Asian Human Rights Commission (AHRC).

The United Nations' Convention against Torture and Other Cruel Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment, known as CAT, was adopted by the UN General Assembly in December 1984 and came into force on June 26, 1987. That date is now recognized as International Day in Support of Victims of Torture. Cambodia ratified the convention in 1992, but torture remains flagrant and widespread.

Speak Truth To Power (“Courage without Borders”) Series in KI-Media - Sister Dianna Ortiz (Guatemala/USA) “Torture”

Speak Truth To Power (“Courage without Borders”) Series - Sister Dianna Ortiz (Guatemala/USA) “Torture”


http://www.scribd.com/full/53408350?access_key=key-1ku295cf78k41o0gx7cc

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Speak Truth To Power (“Courage without Borders”) Series - Sister Digna Ochoa (Mexico) “Human Rights”
http://www.scribd.com/full/53318534?access_key=key-2nvhz4s74fxjbjxz6pka

Cambodian drug centres deny abuse

January 27, 2010
ABC Radio Australia

Operators of drug rehabilitation centres in Cambodia have denied accusations patients are subjected to "sadistic violence". Human Rights Watch claims people are being held in the centres against their will, where they are subjected to torture, rape and humiliation. The organisation is calling for Cambodia authorities to shut down controversial facilities .

Presenter: Stephanie March
Speakers: Joe Amon, director, Health and Human Rights Commission, Human Rights Watch; Nean Sokhim, director, My Chance Drug Detention and Rehabilitation Centre, Phnom Penh

Click here to listen to the audio program (Windows Media)

MARCH: The report by Human Rights Watch says 2,000 people are being held in so-called "drug rehabilitation centres" across Cambodia. Joe Amon is the director of the Health and Human rights commission for the organisation.

AMON: There were reports of beatings, being shocked with electric batons. There were cases where people would describe very specifically how staff and guards would wind together electrical cables together and whip inmates with them. But we also heard about rapes, we heard about people being shackled for long periods of time and being forced to stand in the sun.

MARCH: The report says many of the detainees are picked up by police and military in an effort to get drug users, sex workers and beggars off the street. Others are sent by their families who pay the authorities to treat and rehabilitate the patients. But Mr Amon says it's not only drug users who end up in the facilities.

AMON: Most of them were at some point drug users - not all of them were drug addicted or drug dependant. There were also children in there, adults who hadn't used drugs but got caught up in street sweeps. And also really quite disturbingly individuals with mental illness

MARCH: Government statistics show between 2007 and 2008, there was a 40% increase in the number of people in the the centres. Mr Amon says the centres are an easy way for authorities to keep so-called undesirables off the street.

AMON: And the other is profit. You know family members that are paying to have individuals picked up and put in these centres. You know that money is against Cambodian law, by law it says drug dependency treatment should be free. And that money is going directly into the pocket of the people running the centres.

MARCH: Nean Sokhim is the director of the civilian-run "My Chance" drug rehabilitation centre in Phnom Penh. He says patients are treated well, receive three meals a day and have job training opportunities.

SOKHIM: In my centre is no murder happen, no problem eh.

MARCH: Is there any violence towards the people in your centre from the guards?

SOKHIM: No, never.

MARCH: The is a report that has come out from a human rights organisation that says people that are tortured and kept against their will. What do you say about this report?

SOKHIM: No, no never happen like this. But the Human Rights Watch always say, always advise bad about the drug rehab centre in Cambodia. I don't know why because in my centre I always try to do everything better and better.

He says some detainees have tried to run away in the past.

SOKHIM: We have some, but all of them because we (inaudible) them and we can drug them and we forbid them to do the work at the outside of the after they can escape.

MARCH: So if someone tries to run away you give them drugs so they can't escape?

SOKHIM: Yeah, yeah yeah.

MARCH: Human Rights Watch says there are at least 11 drug centres operating in Cambodia. Some are run by the police and military while others are operated by civilians. Mr Sokhim says while there is no abuse at his centre he can't vouch for those run by the security forces.

SOKHIM: For other centre, they can violence at the centre governed by the police, governed by the military police. But in my centre is civil governed.

MARCH: Human Rights Watch is calling for all the drug rehab centres to be closed down and investigated for rights abuse. Joe Amon from the organisation says detention centres are the wrong way to tackle drug abuse.

AMON: The World Health Organisation did an assessment and they said in their report that they estimated that it was close to 100 percent relapse for the people who have been in these centres.. It's just the wrong way to approach drug addiction. Drug addiction is a chronic relapsing condition. It's not helped by a period of military drills and forced exercise.

Mr Sokhim estimates 70 percent of the 2,500 people who have been in his centre since it opened in 2006 have successfully managed to conquer drug abuse.

Cambodian rehab centres torture drug users: rights group

Monday, January 25, 2010
AFP

PHNOM PENH — Detainees at Cambodian government-run drug rehabilitation centres suffer "sadistic violence" such as electric shocks, forced labour and rape, a human rights group said Monday.

Human Rights Watch (HRW) called on Cambodia to close at least 11 centres around the country where it said people are often arbitrarily sent without reasonable cause, suffer grave abuses and are denied access to a lawyer.

"Many detainees are subjected to sadistic violence, including being shocked with electric batons and whipped with twisted electrical wire," said a 93-page report from the group.

"Arduous physical exercises and labour are the mainstays of supposed drug 'treatment'," it added.

Rights groups have made allegations about abuse at Cambodia's drug rehabilitation centres and UN health officials have questioned their treatment methods in the past.

"Individuals in these centres are not being treated or rehabilitated, they are being illegally detained and often tortured," said Joseph Amon, director of the health and human rights division at HRW.

"These centres do not need to be revamped or modified; they need to be shut down."

HRW also alleged detainees were forced to have sex with staff and to donate blood, were fed rotten or insect-ridden food and chained while standing in the sun as physical punishment.

The centres, run by various branches of the Cambodian state including police and the ministry of social affairs, detained nearly 2,400 people in 2008, according to the report.

Detainees were arrested for drug use and vagrancy, but were also frequently rounded up in police sweeps of people considered "undesirable" in advance of national holidays or international meetings, it added.

Government data revealed that more than 500 of the detainees were aged under 18, HRW said, and one former 16-year-old detainee named M'noh described staff members using electrical wire for whippings.

"[A staff member] would use the cable to beat people... On each whip the person's skin would come off and stick on the cable," he said in the report.

Rights Groups Calls for Halt to Torture

By Taing Sarada, VOA Khmer
Original report from Washington
24 June 2008

The rights group Adhoc and the Asian Human Rights Commission plan to broadcast a radio program appealing to the Cambodian government to prevent torture, for UN Anti-Torture Day, Thursday.

Adhoc "will set up a radio program and will cooperate with the Asian Human Rights Commission in Hong Kong in order to broadcast, disseminate and call for the Cambodian government to prevent, halt and to [work] against torture in Cambodia, which has happened in some prisons and police custody," Adhoc investigator Chan Saveth told VOA Khmer.

Torture cases have decreased in Cambodia but they still occur, he said.

One suspect, Yan Sokea, was arrested in Preah Vihear province but died in Prey Sar prison when he wasn't given adequate medical attention, Chan Saveth said.

He was severely beaten by prison guards, Chan Saveth said.

Ministry of Interior spokesman Khieu Sopheak denied torture occurs in prisons or while suspects are in custody.

"We have never seen such a thing happen," he said, adding that the government has issued information to all police institutions to stop the use of torture.

Cambodia ratified the Optional Protocol Against Torture in 2007.

The government must institute stronger measures to monitor prisons and other detention facilities, said Lao Monghay, a senior researcher at the Rights Commission.